Read Ebook: The Terror Out of Space by Swain Dwight V Terry W E Illustrator

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Ebook has 639 lines and 28634 words, and 13 pages

And there I sit Reading old things, Of knights and lorn damsels, While the wind sings-- Oh, drearily sings!

I never look out Nor attend to the blast; For all to be seen Is the leaves falling fast: Falling, falling!

But close at the hearth, Like a cricket, sit I, Reading of summer And chivalry-- Gallant chivalry!

Then with an old friend I talk of our youth-- How 'twas gladsome, but often Foolish, forsooth: But gladsome, gladsome!

Or to get merry We sing some old rhyme, That made the wood ring again In summer time-- Sweet summer time!

Then go we to smoking, Silent and snug: Nought passes between us, Save a brown jug-- Sometimes!

And sometimes a tear Will rise in each eye, Seeing the two old friends So merrily-- So merrily!

And ere to bed Go we, go we, Down on the ashes We kneel on the knee, Praying together!

Then the clouds part, Swallows soaring between; The spring is alive, And the meadows are green!

I jump up, like mad, Break the old pipe in twain, And away to the meadows, The meadows again!

I had very little hesitation, from internal evidence alone, in identifying these verses with those which FitzGerald had written, as he said, when a lad, or little more than a lad, and sent to the Athenaeum, but all question has been set at rest by the discovery of a copy in a common-place book belonging to the late Archdeacon Allen, with the heading 'E. F. G.,' and the date 'Naseby, Spring, 1831.' This copy differs slightly from those in the Year Book and in the Athenaeum, and in place of the tenth stanza it has,

So winter passeth Like a long sleep From falling autumn To primrose-peep.

But although at this time he appears to have written nothing more himself he was not unmindful of what was done by others, for in May 1831 he writes to Allen, 'I have bought A. Tennyson's poems. How good Mariana is!' And again a year later, after a night-ride on the coach to London, 'I forgot to tell you that when I came up in the mail, and fell a dozing in the morning, the sights of the pages in crimson and the funerals which the Lady of Shalott saw and wove, floated before me: really, the poem has taken lodging in my poor head.'

The correspondence will now for the most part tell its own story, and with it all that is to be told of FitzGerald's life.

In October and November 1831 he was for three weeks in town with Thackeray, and in the following summer was thinking of joining him at Havre when he wrote to his friend Allen.

MY DEAR ALLEN,

. . . And now I will tell you of a pilgrimage I made that put me in mind of you much. I went to Salisbury to see the Cathedral, but more to walk to Bemerton, George Herbert's village. It is about a mile and half from Salisbury alongside a pleasant stream with old-fashioned watermills beside: through fields very fertile. When I got to Bemerton I scarcely knew what to do with myself. It is a very pretty village with the Church and Parsonage much as Herbert must have left it. But there is no memorial of him either in or outside the walls of the church: though there have been Bishops and Deans and I know not what all so close at hand at Salisbury. This is a great shame indeed. I would gladly put up a plain stone if I could get the Rector's leave. I was very sorry to see no tablet of any kind. The people in the Cottages had heard of a very pious man named Herbert, and had read his books--but they don't know where he lies. I have drawn the church and village: the little woodcut of it in Walton's Lives is very like. I thought I must have passed along the spot in the road where he assisted the man with the fallen horse: and to shew the benefit of good examples, I was serviceable that very evening in the town to some people coming in a cart: for the driver was drunk and driving furiously home from the races, and I believe would have fallen out, but that some folks, amongst whom I was one, stopped the cart. This long history is now at an end. I wanted John Allen much to be with me. I noticed the little window into which Herbert's friend looked, and saw him kneeling so long before the altar, when he was first ordained.

In the summer and autumn of this year FitzGerald spent some weeks at Tenby and was a good deal with Allen to whom he wrote on his return to London.

MY DEAR ALLEN,

I suppose it must seem strange to you that I should like writing letters: and indeed I don't know that I do like it in general. However, here I see no companions, so I am pleased to talk to my old friend John Allen: which indeed keeps alive my humanity very much. . . . I have been about to divers Bookshops and have bought several books--a Bacon's Essays, Evelyn's Sylva, Browne's Religio Medici, Hazlitt's Poets, etc. The latter I bought to add to my Paradise, which however has stood still of late. I mean to write out Carew's verses in this letter for you, and your Paradise. As to the Religio, I have read it again: and keep my opinion of it: except admiring the eloquence, and beauty of the notions, more. But the arguments are not more convincing. Nevertheless, it is a very fine piece of English: which is, I believe, all that you contend for. Hazlitt's Poets is the best selection I have ever seen. I have read some Chaucer too, which I like. In short I have been reading a good deal since I have been here: but not much in the way of knowledge.

. . . As I lay in bed this morning, half dozing, I walked in imagination all the way from Tenby to Freestone by the road I know so well: by the water-mill, by Gumfreston, Ivy tower, and through the gates, and the long road that leads to Carew.

Now for the poet Carew:

Ask me no more where Jove bestows, When June is past, the fading rose: For in your beauty's orient deep, The flowers, as in their causes, sleep.

Ask me no more whither do stray The golden atoms of the day: For in pure love did Heav'n prepare Those powders to enrich your hair.

Ask me no more whither doth haste The nightingale when June is past: For in your sweet dividing throat She winters, and keeps warm her note.

Ask me no more where those stars light That downward fall at dead of night: For in your eyes they sit, and there Fixed become, as in their sphere.

Ask me no more if east or west The phoenix builds her spicy nest: For unto you at last she flies, And in your fragrant bosom dies.

These lines are exaggerated, as all in Charles's time, but very beautiful. . . .

Yours most affectionately, E.

MY DEAR ALLEN,

The first thing I do in answering your letter is to tell you that I am angry at your saying that your conscience pricks you for not having written to me before. I am of that superior race of men, that are quite content to hear themselves talk, and read their own writing. But, in seriousness, I have such love of you, and of myself, that once every week, at least, I feel spurred on by a sort of gathering up of feelings to vent myself in a letter upon you: but if once I hear you say that it makes your conscience thus uneasy till you answer, I shall give it up. Upon my word I tell you, that I do not in the least require it. You, who do not love writing, cannot think that any one else does: but I am sorry to say that I have a very young-lady-like partiality to writing to those that I love. . . . I have been reading Shakespeare's Sonnets: and I believe I am unprejudiced when I say, I had but half an idea of him, Demigod as he seemed before, till I read them carefully. How can Hazlitt call Warton's the finest sonnets? There is the air of pedantry and labour in his. But Shakespeare's are perfectly simple, and have the very essence of tenderness that is only to be found in the best parts of his Romeo and Juliet besides. I have truly been lapped in these Sonnets for some time: they seem all stuck about my heart, like the ballads that used to be on the walls of London. I have put a great many into my Paradise, giving each a fair white sheet for himself: there being nothing worthy to be in the same page. I could talk for an hour about them: but it is not fit in a letter. . . .

I shall tell you of myself, that I have been better since I wrote to you. Mazzinghi tells me that November weather breeds Blue Devils--so that there is a French proverb, 'In October, de Englishman shoot de pheasant: in November he shoot himself.' This I suppose is the case with me: so away with November, as soon as may be. 'Canst thou my Clora' is being put in proper musical trim: and I will write it out for you when all is right. I am sorry you are getting so musical: and if I take your advice about so big a thing as Christianity, take you mine about music. I am sure that this pleasure of music grows so on people, that many of the hours that you would have devoted to Jeremy Taylor, etc. will be melted down into tunes, and the idle train of thought that music puts us into. I fancy I have discovered the true philosophy of this: but I think you must have heard me enlarge. Therefore 'satis.'

I have gabbled on so long that there is scarce room for my quotation. But it shall come though in a shapeless manner, for the sake of room. Have you got in your Christian Poet, a poem by Sir H. Wotton--'How happy is he born or taught, that serveth not another's will'? It is very beautiful, and fit for a Paradise of any kind. Here are some lines from old Lily, which your ear will put in the proper metre. It gives a fine description of a fellow walking in Spring, and looking here and there, and pricking up his ears, as different birds sing. 'What bird so sings, but doth so wail? Oh! 'tis the ravished nightingale: "Jug, jug, jug, jug, terue," she cries, and still her woes at midnight rise. Brave prick-song! who is't now we hear? It is the lark so shrill and clear: against heaven's gate he claps his wings, the morn not waking till he sings. Hark, too, with what a pretty note poor Robin Redbreast tunes his throat: Hark how the jolly cuckoos sing "Cuckoo" to welcome in the Spring: "Cuckoo" to welcome in the Spring.' This is very English, and pleasant, I think: and so I hope you will. I could have sent you many a more sentimental thing, but nothing better. I admit nothing into my Paradise, but such as breathe content, and virtue: I count 'Back and syde' to breathe both of these, with a little good drink over.

P.S. I sealed up my letter yesterday, forgetting to finish. I write thus soon 'becase I gets a frank.' You shall benefit by another bit of poetry. I do not admit it into my Paradise, being too gloomy: but it will please both of us. It is the prototype of the Pensieroso.

Hence all you vain delights! As short as are the nights Wherein you spend your folly! There's nought in this life sweet, If man were wise to see 't, But only melancholy; Oh sweetest melancholy! Welcome folded arms, and fixed eyes, A sigh, that piercing mortifies, A look that's fastened to the ground, A tongue chain'd up without a sound!

Fountain heads, and pathless gloves, Places which pale passion loves! Moonlight walks, when all the fowls Are warmly hous'd, save bats and owls! A midnight dell, a passing groan! These are the sounds we feed upon; Then stretch our bones in a still gloomy valley; Nothing's so dainty sweet as melancholy.

I think these lines are quite of the finest order, and have a more headlong melancholy than Milton's, which are distinctly copied from these, as you must confess. And now this is a very long letter, and the best thing you can do when you get to the end, is to Da Capo, and read what I ordered you about answering. My dear fellow, it is a great pleasure to me to write to you; and to write out these dear poems. . . . Believe me that I am your very loving friend,

E. F. G.

MY DEAR ALLEN,

You can hardly have got through my last letter by this time. I hope you liked the verses I sent you. The news of this week is that Thackeray has come to London, but is going to leave it again for Devonshire directly. He came very opportunely to divert my Blue Devils: notwithstanding, we do not see very much of each other: and he has now so many friends that he has no such wish for my society. He is as full of good humour and kindness as ever. The next news is that a new volume of Tennyson is out: containing nothing more than you have in MS. except one or two things not worth having. . . .

When you write back send me an account that you and your Brother were once telling me at Bosherston, of three Generals condemned to die after the siege of Pembroke in Cromwell's time: and of the lot being brought by a little child. Give me their names, etc. pretty circumstantially: or else, tell me where I can find some notice of it. . . .

I have been poring over Wordsworth lately: which has had much effect in bettering my Blue Devils: for his philosophy does not abjure melancholy, but puts a pleasant countenance upon it, and connects it with humanity. It is very well, if the sensibility that makes us fearful of ourselves is diverted to become a cause of sympathy and interest with Nature and mankind: and this I think Wordsworth tends to do. I think I told you of Shakespeare's sonnets before: I cannot tell you what sweetness I find in them.

So by Shakespeare's Sonnets roasted, and Wordsworth's poems basted, My heart will be well toasted, and excellently tasted.

This beautiful couplet must delight you, I think. I will also give you the two last verses about Clora: though it is more complete and better without them: strange to say. You must have the goodness to repeat those you know over first, and then fall upon these: for there is a sort of reasoning in them, which requires proper order, as much as a proposition of Euclid. The first of them is not to my liking, but it is too much trouble about a little thing to work it into a better. You have the two first stanzas --"ergo"

Nothing can utterly die: Music aloft upspringing Turns to pure atoms of sky Each golden note of thy singing: And that to which morning did listen At eve in a rainbow may glisten.

Beauty, when laid in the grave, Feedeth the lily beside her: Therefore the soul cannot have Station or honour denied her: She will not better her essence, But wear a crown in God's presence.

Q.E.D.

And I think there is quite enough of Clora and her music. I am hunting about the town for an ancient drinking cup, which I may use when I am in my house, in quality of housekeeper. Have the goodness to make my remembrances to all at that most pleasant house Freestone: I am quite serious in telling you how it is by far the pleasantest family I ever was among.

My sister is far better. We walk very much and see such sights as the town affords. To-day I have bought a little terrier to keep me company. You will think this is from my reading of Wordsworth: but if that were my cue, I should go no further than keeping a primrose in a pot for society. Farewell, dear Allen. I am astonished to find myself writing a very long letter once a week to you: but it is next to talking to you: and after having seen you so much this summer, I cannot break off suddenly.

I am your most affectionate friend,

E. F. G.

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